Standard Yorùbá context dependent tone identification using Multi-Class Support Vector Machine (MSVM)

Most state-of-the-art large vocabulary continuous speech recognition systems employ context dependent (CD) phone units, however, the CD phone units are not efficient in capturing long-term spectral dependencies of tone in most tone languages. The Standard Yorùbá (SY) is a language composed of syllable with tones and requires different method for the acoustic modeling. In this paper, a context dependent tone acoustic model was developed. Tone unit is assumed as syllables, amplitude magnified difference function (AMDF) was used to derive the utterance wide F contour, followed by automatic syllabification and tri-syllable forced alignment with speech phonetization alignment and syllabification SPPAS tool. For classification of the context dependent (CD) tone, slope and intercept of F values were extracted from each segmented unit. Supervised clustering scheme was utilized to partition CD tri-tone based on category and normalized based on some statistics to derive the acoustic feature vectors. Multi-class support vector machine (MSVM) was used for tri-tone training. From the experimental results, it was observed that the word recognition accuracy obtained from the MSVM tri-tone system based on dynamic programming tone embedded features was comparable with phone features. A best parameter tuning was obtained for 10-fold cross validation and overall accuracy was 97.5678%. In term of word error rate (WER), the MSVM CD tri-tone system outperforms the hidden Markov model tri-phone system with WER of 44.47%.Keywords: Syllabification, Standard Yorùbá, Context Dependent Tone, Tri-tone Recognitio

Long-term morbidity from severe pneumonia in early childhood in The Gambia, West Africa: a follow-up study

OBJECTIVE: To assess long-term outcomes in severe early childhood pneumonia in The Gambia. DESIGN: Observational cohort study of children hospitalised with severe pneumonia between 1992 and 1 04 compared to age, sex, and neigh bourhood-marched controls on measures of current general and pulmonary health. RESULTS: Of 83 children successfully traced, 68 of the 69 alive at follow-up agreed to participate. Thirteen per Cent of cases and 4% of controls had lung disease clinically or on spirometry. Another 16 (13%) participants had abnormal spirometry but did not meet the American Thoracic Society technical criteria (formally 'inconclusive'). Odds ratios of lung disease among childhood pneumonia cases were 2.93 (95 %CI 0.69-12.48, P = 0.1468) with incon-clusives omitted; 2.53 (95 %CI 0.61-10.59, P = 0.2033) with inconclusives included as normal; and 2.83 (95%CI 1.09-7.36, P = 0.0334) with inconclusives included as lung disease. Among deceased cases, most deaths were reported within weeks of discharge, suggesting a possible connection between admission and subsequent death. CONCLUSION: These African data, while not conclusive, add to previous data suggesting a link between severe early, childhood pneumonia and later chronic lung disease. While larger-scale research is needed, increased awareness of possible long-term morbidity in children with severe pneumonia is warranted to limit its impact and optimise long-term health

Growth Performance of Broiler Chickens Fed Diets Containing Partially Cooked Sweet Potato Meal

A feeding trial was conducted to investigate the effect of partially cooked sweet potato meal on the performance of broiler chikens. A total of two hundred 8 day-old Anak 2000 strain broiler chicks were used. Partially cooked sweet potato meal (PCSPM) was included at 0, 20, 40, 60 and 80% levels designated as diets; I, II, III, IV and V respectively. The broiler chicks after brooding were randomly allotted to the five dietary tratments, each replicated four times with ten chicks per replicate in a completely ramdomised design. The feeding trial lasted for a period of eight weeks. Feed and water were provided at ad libitum. The results showed that daily weight gain was highly significantly (P<0.01) affected by dietary treatments. Such that any increase in the proportion of PCSPM in the starter diet negatively influenced weight gain. Feed conversion ratio was also highly significantly (P<0.01) affected, however, FCR increases with increase in the proportion of PCSPM. In the finisher phase, there is significant (P<0.0) difference in daily weight gain and feed conversion ratio. In the pooled performance, daily feed intake was significantly (P<0.05) influenced by dietary treatments. There is however no difference in feed consumption between the birds fed diet V (80% PCSPM) and those on control diet (0% PCSPM). It can be concluded that, PCSPM can be fed to broiler chickens at up to 80% level with a promising groth performance Keyword: Growth, Partially cooked, Performance, sweet potat

Nutrient Movements through Ruminant Livestock Production Systems

Considerable attention has been paid to reducing nutrient emissions from ruminant livestock in the last few decades. This area will continue to attract considerable research in the future due to increasing farm sizes in some developed countries as well as the increasing demand for meat and dairy products, particularly in developing countries. This paper discusses the deposition and losses of carbon and nitrogen in soils and plants in grazed and harvested forage systems as well as utilization and losses of both nutrients by ruminants in both systems. The paper also outlines several soil, plant, and animal-focused strategies that can be used to reduce carbon and nitrogen losses from ruminant livestock systems. These strategies will become increasingly important due to the need to feed the growing population of the world while reducing environmental pollution from ruminant livestock systems

The Influence of Residual Linamarin in Dried Cassava Peel Meal on Carcass Yield and Gut Characteristics of Weaner Rabbits

A feeding trial was conducted to assess the effects of residual linamarin on carcass yield and gut characteristics of rabbits fed diets containing sun dried cassava peel meal (CPM). The experiment was conducted using a completely randomized design involving four diets of 16% crude protein. The CPM was included at 0, 30, 35 and 40% levels. Rabbits used for the studies were fed for 42 days and were all serially slaughtered fortnightly. During each slaughter, two rabbits were randomly selected, starved overnight and slaughtered. They were skinned, eviscerated and the carcasses cut up into parts and weighed. The guts were separated into; small intestine, large intestine, caecum and appendix. Each of the visceral parts were weighed and their length recorded. The results showed that chest and back were significantly (P<0.05) affected by dietary treatments. Also the carcass yield obtained over time of slaughter indicated a significant (P<0.05) effect on the weight of the back. The time of slaughter x diet interaction effect showed no significant difference on all parameters. The results of the guts showed that, dietary influence were only obtained on the weights of the caeca (P<0.001) and appendix (P<0.05). There were significant diferences on the  weights of large intestine (P<0.05), caeca (P<0.01) and appendix (P<0.001) over the period of slaughter. There is also a highly significant (P<0.001) difference in the length of the caeca. The results of the interaction effect on time of slaughter x diet for all the visceral parts (guts) measured showed a highly significant (P<0.001) interaction effect on the weight of the caeca and that of the small intestine (P<0.05). The studies indicated that despite sun drying, linamarin, a cyanogenic glucosides still has some potential toxic effects as manifested on the carcass yield, large intestine, caeca and appendix. It is thus, suggested that prolonged feeding of CPM must be investigated to safeguard against poisoning. It might also affect caecotrophy in the caeca and the absorption of nutrients in the appendix. Keywords: Linamarin, gut characteristics, dried cassava peels, rabbit

An appraisal of blood pressure control and its determinants among patients with primary hypertension seen in a primary care setting in Western Nigeria

Background: Achieving guideline-recommended blood pressure is imperative in reducing the rising tide of uncontrolled hypertension and its attendant sequelae, which are major causes of morbidity and mortality globally. The aim of the study was to describe the pattern of blood pressure control and identify the factors influencing blood pressure control among patients with primary hypertension seen at family medicine clinics of FMC, Abeokuta.Methods: This was a descriptive cross-sectional hospital-based study. A systematic random sampling technique was used in selecting 360 hypertensive respondents over four months. Data were collected through a pre-tested interviewer-administered questionnaire. The Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) version 17.0 was used to analyse data.Results: Blood pressure was controlled in 167 (46.4%) of the respondents. The independent predictors of blood pressure control were female gender (p = 0.001, OR = 2.494, 95% confidence interval (CI) = 1.477–4.214), regular use of medication (p = 0.001, OR = 2.900, 95% CI = 1.508–5.577), regular clinic attendance (p < 0.001, OR = 3.512, 95% CI = 1.772–6.960), and absence of diabetes mellitus (p < 0.001, OR = 7.357, 95% CI = 3.190–16.966).Conclusions: The rate of blood pressure control among the hypertensive respondents was low. Multiple independent predictors of controlled blood pressure call for a team-based approach as well as multiple approaches including education of patients, expansion of a community-based health insurance programme and intensification of treatment efforts when managing hypertensive patients.Keywords: blood pressure control, family medicine clinics, primary hypertensio

Effect of varying levels and sources of dietary fat on growth performance and nutrient gigestibility in rabbits

The effects of dietary fat sources and levels on growth performance and nutrient digestibility were investigated in cross-breed Lopx New Zealand rabbits. Fifty weaned rabbits were randomly allotted to five dietary treatments consisting of a control (no fat) and four others with fat, either from plant (groundnut oil) or animal (butter) sources, each at two levels (3% and 6%) of inclusion. There were ten rabbits per diet. Rabbits on 6% animal fat-based diet recorded the highest (P<O.Ol) better in rabbits on 6% animal diet. Organic matter intake (OMI) was observed to be similar between rabbits fed control and 3% animal fat diets. However, the 6% butter fat diet recorded the lowest. Crude protein digestibility (CPD) was similar in rabbit fed 3% and 6% level of animal fat which were the highest while 6% level of plant fat diet had the lowest CPD. These findings show that the inclusion of animal fat at 6% level improved the weight gain and efficiency of feed utilization in rabbits

Effect of Ferulic Acid Esterase Enzyme Application on the \u3ci\u3ein Vitro\u3c/i\u3e Digestibility and \u3ci\u3ein Situ\u3c/i\u3e Rumen Degradability of Tropical Grasses

Tropical grasses are the primary staple diet of most of the domesticated ruminants in the tropical and subtropical regions of the world. However, dry matter (DM) digestibility (DMD) and intake levels of these C4 grasses are considerably low, partly because of high lignin contents. Ferulic acid also impedes fibre digestion in such forages due to formation of cross linkages with digestible xylans. Certain esterase enzymes have been shown to cleave ferulic acid cross linkages in wheat bran but no studies have examined whether such enzymes can be used to increase the digestion of tropical grasses. Therefore, the objective of this work was to evaluate the effect of a ferulic acid esterase preparation applied at different rates on the digestibility of C4 grasses

Microalbuminuria, Other Markers of Nephropathy and Biochemical Derangements in Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus: Relationships and Determinants

Background: Microalbuminuria is an early indicator of Diabetic nephropathy and cerebrovascular disease.Objective: To evaluate relationships between microalbuminuria and other predictors of morbidity and mortality in type 2 DM.Methods: Fifty type 2 diabetic subjects were recruited each for three groups separated by disease durations. Thirty non-diabetic subjects were recruited to control each group. Urine albumin-to-creatinine ratio (ACR) was estimated. Fasting plasma glucose (FPG), serum creatinine, urea, total cholesterol (TC), triglycerides (TG), high- and low density lipoprotein (HDL, LDL) were measured.Results: The diabetics with longest disease duration of &gt;10 years were the oldest (65.86±1.71), had highest systolic BP (147.12±3.39mmHg) and least BMI (27.20±0.71Kg/m2); they had poorest lipid control (TC:5.54±0.26mmol/L),though with the least TG (0.97±0.09mmol/L); they also had the most severe microalbuminuria (33.63±8.03g/L) and ACR (65.85±10.38mg/gm). Patients with diabetes of 5-10 years had the poorest glycaemic control:FPG- 7.82±0.47mmol/L; HbA1c-13.09±0.74%). Significant negative correlations exist between microalbuminuria,HBA1c(r=-2.28, p=0.028) and serum creatinine(r=-2.11,p=0.042) in patients with 5-10 years disease; a positive correlation between the ACR and TC(r=1.00,p&lt;0.01) in those with &gt;10 years disease. In multivariate analysis, independent predictors of microalbuminuria were disease duration (OR 2.2, p&lt; 0.001); HBA1c (OR 7.3, p=0.02); LDL/HDL ratio (OR 13.4, p&lt; 0.001).Conclusion: The severity and progression of albuminuria are associated with longer duration of diabetes and poor glycaemic control. Significant relationships exist between ACR and HBA1c, TC, HDL-C, TG, creatinine. Disease duration, ethnicity, HBA1c, TC, TG, HDL-C and LDL/HDL ratio are independent predictors of albuminuria.Keywords: diabetes, microalbuminuria, albumin-to-creatinine ratio, dyslipidaemia, nephropathy, cardiovascular diseaseFunding: None declare